Testing your food science trivia

News

By Laura Webb and Mandy Jian

If you are interested in expanding your professional network and experience in the food industry, please read this post to get more insight in getting involved with the Food Science Association, and/or apply your food science trivia by joining next year’s College Bowl team!

The annual IFTSA North Atlantic Area Meeting & College Bowl competition of 2019 is a weekend-long event where universities within the North Atlantic region (McGill University, University of Maine, Rutgers University, Cornell University, University of Massachusetts Amherst) gather to expand their professional network with the next generation of food scientists and with food industry professionals, and compete in a trivia competition. This year, it was hosted by Maine University, where the weekend began with an Area Meeting presentation by the Chapter Leaders of each university to update the other chapters of the contributions and events organized for the students at their university.

“Having the honor of being this year’s Chapter Leader of McGill’s Food Science Association, I was proud to present to our fellow Chapters the hard work my executive team put into organizing events such as our ‘Open Meeting & Pizza Party Workshop’, ‘Start Your Own Business’ seminar for aspiring entrepreneurs, ‘Holiday Party & Food Drive’, ‘Food Industry Roundtable’ event with McGill alumni, ‘Brewery Tour’, Food ventures, and various volunteering, internship, and employment opportunities for our students. It was also inspiring to hear the other unique events thrown by the other chapters, which the FSA’s new executive team could consider bringing to students in the upcoming school year.” - Mandy Jian (U4 Food Science & Nutrition major, President of the FSA)

When you hear college bowl, many people think of football, but this college bowl is quite different. In fact, the IFTSA College Bowl is a trivia-based competition that tests student teams from various universities on concepts relating to food science/technology, food laws, food processing, and history of food. The winner from these regional competitions then goes to IFT19 in New Orleans to compete, to determine the national winner.

This years’ McGill College Bowl team comprised of 13 undergraduate students:

Ada Du (Coach), Amalie Younes, Bridget Zie (Coach), Daphne Liu, Emmanuelle Bonin, Hamza Chughtai, Hélène Truong, Nancy He (Team Captain), Punyanit Siripun, Rami Bahawan (Coach), Yeojin Joo, Yunxuan Lan, and Zeynep Memiguven. McGill was eager to show off their knowledge and school spirit during the competition. With the support of the Food Science Associations executives in the crowd, McGill won the first round of the double-elimination competition against the University of Massachusetts Amherst. The underdog team ultimately lost against Cornell University, followed by the University of Massachusetts Amherst in intense rounds that kept the McGill cheerleaders on the edge of their seats.

“Attending the College bowl and Area meeting was fun, and was a great opportunity to meet like-minded individuals that share the same passion for food science! This event has opened more doors in the future with IFTSA, that I didn’t know about until after attending this event.”- Sharvani Ram (U0 Food Science & Nutrition major, U0 Representative of the FSA)

The event was also a great opportunity for the students to network with other undergraduate and graduate students from various universities. The Area Meeting continues to inspire students to grow the Food Science Association with the community on campus.

“My favorite part was the product development activity. It really allowed us to network with other competitors” - Laura Webb (U2 Food Science & Nutrition major, Concurrent Representative of the FSA).

From this event, we got to network with several undergraduates and graduates from various universities. It is was great to engage with creative individuals during the Area Meeting, and inspires us to strengthen and grow our own McGill Food Science Association with our community on campus. Although McGill did not win, this will drive the upcoming team to start practices earlier improve for next year! The College bowl inspired a large group of students to learn more about their major and improve their standing at Cornell University next year. Go, McGill!